It's nothing but Jacob and Man in Black, from what I hear. This should be backstory-city

Looks like we're starting with someone shipwrecked on the island. The way it always starts.That's a Greek person, I can tell by the hair. Probably not. Wild guess. And pregnant, too.

Who the heck are these people? That's Alison Janney. I think they're speaking Roman. I bet this is the ancient version of Jacob and Man In Black.

"Every question will lead to another question" - that's *so* LOST.

I wonder if that boy is Jacob, or Man In Black. Jacob. And another one. Maybe this one is all black smoke. Ha. Hm. The Alison Janney character just killed the mom. That's not very nice.

Young Jacob and Man in Black, playing a game. Mom weaves, right now. Man in Black is special. This is so cryptic, this conversation between MIB and Mom. I wonder if Mom will turn out to be someone out of mythology. Hm. There are other people on the island. What reason, indeed? I don't think we're going to get to find that out.

"I've made it so you can never hurt each other." A goldenr rock. "This is the reason we're here.' It's the magnetic anomaly, I'm guessing that's what the "warm, bright light" is. This is a little too "new agey, space-agey, cryptic" for me. It sounds like they don't really have any specific reason.

Why can't they both protect the light? Because then it wouldn’t be a contest.

Funny how Kid in Black can see the ghost of Mom, but Jacob can't. Because only Jacob can see the dead.

Ah, the settlement is the people (Romans) who were shipwrecked. I guess they're the progenitors of the Others or the Primitives.

But how does Kid in Black become Smokey? Right now he's a kid who can't leave the island and there's something magical about it, and Mom is protecting the golden thing. And Mom loves Kid in Black more than Jacob.

Now he's grown Jacob. And grown Man In Black is with the people. Whoever the people are. Man In Black's people. This is the genesis of the later discussion about how people are either good or bad.

They dig and find things. I wonder if this is the start of the frozen donkey wheel. It's like a primitive Dharma Project.

Good point by Man in Black - "you wouldn't tell me". And wouldn't tell us, either. There's the wheel! More rock smacking by Mom. "It's time" - for what? Maybe this is how he becomes smoke monster.

Why not go down there? What's worse than death? He could choose not to protect the island. "Take the cup and drink" - a little heavy on the symbolism there, aren't we?

Man In Black's well is all filled up. And something is on fire. All his people are gone. How did she pull this off? And why not do it a long time ago?

Now all her stuff is all messed up. That's where the white and black stone came from. She probably couldn't die, so that's why she thanked him.

The Golden Cave. And that's how you become smoke monster. Sure. Why not?

Main In Black and Mom are Adam and Eve. Woah. That wasn't expected. Well, I'll be darned. But what about Smokey's ability to be Man In Black? I guess it relates to Smokey's ability to look like dead people.

Summary: Meh. For what was supposed to be so revelatory, this was way too new-agey, spacey, cryptic and disappointing. It was vague and "significant", in a forced way and that didn't work for me. I didn't want detailed technical explanations, but I wanted something more.

I was going to add more comments after thinking on it, but instead I'm posting thoughts over at krylyr's LJ so go there to check it out.

Maybe a meh-plus. Might've been fun to see this episode last season, or even earlier this season; now it just smacks of attempting to tie up loose ends. I was really bugged that they showed us Jack and Kate finding Adam & Eve. We get it, guys. Don't show us the answers to secrets we can figure out from the clues, explain how a donkey wheel turning water...does...something with the source...which MiB figured out because "he's special."

Only thing this ep did was to give more sympathy for MiB. He did have it rough.

And Allison Janney had a really rotten Latin accent. Not that I speak Latin, but I could tell. Thank God she didn't have to use it the whole time.

They don't even have to totally explain the "turning the wheel" thing. Just say it twists the source of the light and bends the world around it. Or something like that. Just enough to give us a taste that they've actually thought about it.

Yes, you're exactly right. SOME kind of explanation was needed for the wheel/water/source would have been good. Even better would have been showing it--he could have cranked the wheel a bit and we could have seen a glimpse of a future event (ideally the plane crashing or something...)